Paul beats good friend Opelka to book semi-final spot in Dallas

No 3 seed Tommy Paul beat wild card Reilly Opelka 7-6 (3), 6-2 in an all-American matchup to reach the last four of the Dallas Open at the Ford Center at The Star on Saturday night.

Paul did a fantastic job returning against the huger-serving Opelka. The defending champion won 46 percent of his second-serve return points and even an impressive 34 percent when Opelka made his first delivery.

“I think I did a good job when I got my racket on the return of putting it in the court and doing something decent with it,” Paul said during his post-match interview. “I’m not sure if he had his best serving night; I don’t think he did. But you still gotta put those returns in and win those points It’s not always easy…. I started slicing a bunch and it was tough for him on these courts especially. [The balls] are pretty quick through the court and don’t bounce much.”

This marked the first-ever meeting on the main tour between Paul and Opelka, who used to be roommates while living and training in Florida. They had faced each other just once on the Challenger circuit back in 2018.

“Super weird (that this was our first ATP-level match against each other),” Paul commented. “Whenever we tell someone that, they can’t believe it. Obviously he was out for a while with injuries, but other than that we’ve played pretty much the same tournaments our whole career. We were so close to playing each other so many times. So it was cool to play each other in a pretty big match in the states, too.”

Paul will face the winner of the match between No 6 seed Tomas Machac and Canadian Denis Shapovalov. The world No 9 previously edged out wild card Jenson Brooksby 6-7 (6), 6-3, 6-4 and qualifier Ethan Quinn 6-4, 5-7, 6-4.

Opelka, ranked No 145, reached the quarter-finals in Dallas by beating Kazakh Alexander Shevchenko 7-6 (3), 6-4 and Cameron Norrie 4-6, 7-6 (5), 6-4.

Dallas ATP 500, other last 8 results:

• Denis Shapovalov vs. Tomas Machac
• Casper Ruud (2) beat Yoshihito Nishioka: 7-5, 3-2 ret.
• Jaume Munar beat Matteo Arnaldi (8): 6-4, 3-6, 6-3

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